Jack
by Karussell
Summary: He's so, so alive. :albus potter:


**English's not my first language. I hope there's not to many mistakes.**

* * *

 _03\. Mai 2030_

Somebody wipes his cheek with something wet, and he blinks.

He isn't sure how much time has past since the healer left him here, wounds cleaned and with a buzzing head, promising to contact his family.

Presumably not much.

Presumably a whole life.

Wild, fiery red hair burns in the corner of his eye, and pale skin shines like the moon through the semidarkness of the room that would be flooded by light, could he bear the light, but he needs the twilight.

A tear rolls down his cheek.

"Shsh", coos a soft voice.

"Rosie", he croaks and blinks again, before he turns his head and looks into her dark eyes, lost, so lost, and she holds a rag in her hand that she uses to wash the blood of his face and his fingers.

"I'm here", she murmurs.

The wet cloth, a little scratchy, much too cold, closes around his fingertips and rubs them carefully, and it feels too real; like the light, like the pain in his head and his upper body, like the air that fills his lungs.

He's so alive.

"Rosie", he mumbles, "is ... is Laurie ... ?"

She stays silent for a second too long, and he knows what he knew already, didn't want to know, doesn't want to know, and closes his eyes when they threaten to overflow, digs his fingernails into the skin of his palm.

"I'm sorry, Albie ...", she whispers hoarsly.

Her arms close around his gangly form and she hugs him to her chest. His head lands on her bony shoulder as her fingers stroke his tangled hair.

"I'm so sorry."

His heart thumps fast in his chest.

Hot breath tickles Rose's bare neck.

Her fingers dance across his head.

He's so alive.

He's so, so alive.

"Rose."

It's a breathless sob, drowning in tears, much more than a word, but she tightens her hold on him and sniffles quietly and holds him together, for the moment, as he falls apart in her arms.

"I'm sorry."

"My son ... ?"

A lot stronger, but still much too weak.

"I ... can't tell you much, Albie ... We should wait for your healer, I was told to-"

"Rose", he begs, desperate, emphatically, full of hope, destroyed. " _Please_."

* * *

His son is small and fragile and he breathes, breathes deep and rhythmical, eyes closed, hands balled into little fists.

He's a fighter, Scorpius says, who came with Rose and immediatly ran to the baby, a sad, sad smile on his face that really is just a weak lift of the corners of his mouth.

The dimple is missing that'd make it a genuine smile.

Albus barely notices.

His fingertips touch the arm of the newborn gently, the soft, brown skin of his child, and he has to blink to not start crying as the baby does the same, for a moment, just a moment.

A moment too short to look into his eyes.

"I'm sorry", he breathes, choking. "I'm sorry that I didn't proctect you two better. I'm sorry."

Somebody says something about fault that isn't his.

He thinks that maybe it's his Mum who maybe entered the room with Dad, sometime, a century ago, two seconds ago, but he isn't sure and it's not important to him to be sure, because it is his fault.

It _is_ his fault.

His baby's hand opens a little when he strokes it and closes around his pinkie finger.

His heart swells with pride and love and breakes at the very same moment, because the little boy will never reach for Laurie like this.

He won't reach for his Mummy at all, because his Daddy hadn't been careful, hadn't been fast enough, his Daddy had been too late.

A hand rubs up and down Albus's back, shaking and gentle.

We're here, son.

Albus, do you hear me?

We are here, are here, are here.

We are.

He is.

He is - responsable for an innocent, helpless life, destroyed, on the ground, with tears in green eyes and tangled hair and weak knees.

And he is, but - We're here, son, Albus, do you hear me?

Are.

Is.

She is no more.

He pulls his finger from his son's strong grip, whose hand he shouldn't be able to hold for another two weeks, turns around and stumbles over nothing when he trys to take a step.

And then he cowers on the floor, arms wrapped around his trembling body, head down that is pressed into a shoulder the next moment that smells of flowers, and he sobs into his mother's blouse like a little boy waking up from a horrible nightmare.

"Mummy."

* * *

Lily's head leans on his shoulder.

James is humming a lullaby for his sons who's sleeping tight, who they watch with tired, pensive eyes, who's the light in Albus's darkness.

His still trembling fingers are white against the tiny hands of his child.

"Jack", he murmurs.

It's the names Laurie picked.

Jack.

Jack Potter.

Jack Wilson Potter.

"He does look like a Jack", Lily whispers, and her Quidditch robes, grass stained and sweaty, rustle softly when she turns a little in her seat before her fingers ghost over the baby's yellow onesie.

The onesie's too big.

A small baby, the healer had said. Healthy, perfect, beautiful. But a small baby.

"Hey, Jack", James says quietly and stops his humming.

He throws an arm around Albus's shoulders, instead, presses a kiss to his little brother's temple, who's always going to be his little brother, no matter what happend, and closes his eyes.

Lily's stroking over her nephew's short legs.

Albus exhales.


End file.
